Son of East Devon, was born probably in 1552 or 1554. The Raleighs were leading Protestants who used
the new English Prayer Book.

During the last four years of Mary's reign no less than 288
persons were burnt at the stake for their adhesion to the Protestant faith. His
father saw the Vicar of St Thomas's in Exeter hanged
from his church tower and had visited Agnes Prest before she was burned
to death in Exeter. Raleigh narrowly escaped being killed by taking refuge in a church tower.

"The boyhood of Raleigh"

by Millais 1870 Tate Gallery

Raleigh's father, Walter
Raleigh of Fardell,
had moved east from Fardell, on the edge of Dartmoor, upon his marriage to Joan
Drake, a distant relative of the famous sailor, Sir Francis. Walter owned the
manors of Collaton Raleigh and Wythecombe Raleigh. He leased Hayes Barton, a
large house and estate nearby and set up as a gentleman farmer. From here he ran
his growing business and the Raleighs soon owned the grazing rights on both
Lympstone and Woodbury Commons. Joan died in 1530 and was buried in East Budleigh Church. WalterSr.
entered into a short-lived marriage to the daughter of a Genoese merchant, but
was later joined with a third wife named Catherine Champernowne.
Catherine
had
previously been married to Otto Gilbert of Compton Castle, and was the mother of John, Humphrey and Adrian
Gilbert. Her brother was
Vice-Admiral of Devon and her aunt, also
Catherine, had became tutor for Princess Elizabeth. Catherine bore her new husband a
daughter, Margaret, and two more sons: Carew and their youngest, Walter.

When Walter Raleigh Jr. was barely fifteen
years old, he joined a troop of a hundred horse, raised by the Compte de
Montgomerie whose daughter had married a relation of his mother's, James
Champernowne. He was present when the Huguenots, under Admiral Coligny, were
routed at Montentour. He saw their revenge when they murdered Catholics in their
caves in Languedoc by smoking them out like bees in a hive. Later, Walter
narrowly escaped the massacre of St Bartholomew's Day and.

Walter was then sent to Oriel College, Oxford with George Carew; and Charles Champernowne.
He studied Aristotle and became proficient in oratory and philosophy. He soon
tired of University discipline, however, and left for the Middle Temple in
London to study law and debate current affairs. He lived in Islington, then a
rural area with fine mansions, gardens and orchards.

The most influential figure in Walter's life was his half brother, Humphrey Gilbert.
In
Gilbert's study at Limehouse, he read
Sir Humphrey's paper 'Queen
Elizabeth's Academy', met John Dee, a mathematical genius, and first heard of
the latter's vision of the founding of a Tudor Empire in North America, with Elizabeth as its Virginal Queen.

At this time, there was a deepening crisis between England and Spain. The Spanish Papal monopoly in the Americas had been thwarted by
John
Hawkins, who began the lucrative slave trade from Africa to the
Caribbean. This led to the several battles of both Hawkins and Drake.

Young Raleigh was a member of the Middle Temple in 1575; in 1577 he signed himself
'Esq. de Curia' in a Middlesex register; in 1580 he fought two quarrels of his
own. In the late 1570s Raleigh moved in the circles of the
Catholic courtiers, a group which included, besides the three already mentioned,
the Lords Windsor and Compton, the Lords
Charles
and Thomas Howard, George Gifford,
Francis Southwell, Henry Noel, Arthur Gorges,
William Tresham, and William Cornwallis, among others, most of them practising
Roman Catholics, as well as others who came less often to Court, like the Earls
of Northumberland and
Southampton, Thomas Lord Paget, and
Phillip Howard, the
Duke of Norfolk’s son and heir.

In 1578, Sir Humphrey Gilbert received letters
patent from the Queen to sail in search of remote heathen and barbarous lands
and territories not possessed by any Christian princes.
Gilbert's venture sought to mobilize younger sons of the gentry and
landed-class Catholics to establish estates in the new world, and a handful of
courtiers and nobles, notably the Queen's
secretary Sir Francis Walsingham
and the Earl of Sussex,
along with a number of landed-class stockholders and the gentry who actually
went to settle, provided most of the financial support for it. Raleigh captained the Falcon
with Simon Fernandez as master. The Falcon was a tiny vessel less than
seventy-five feet long, with a complement of gentlemen, soldiers and mariners,
some seventy in all. Raleigh's cabin was on the poop deck in the stern, below
was Fernandez with the charts and navigational instruments, below that was the
cabin for the officers. At the forecastle were the quarters of the skilled
mariners, the smith, the carpenter and the sail-maker. In the centre, dark and
cramped, the deck painted blood red, were the rest of the practical crew. They
slept on folded sails between the guns, in skin rotting damp. The less fortunate
groaned with dysentery, typhus, beri beri or scurvy. The food was mere gruel,
salt beef, flat beer and weevil infested biscuits from the hold; but it was
ruthlessly controlled by the boson. Theft of food was a serious crime and the
punishment was to nail the offender's hand to the mast and cut it off. The stump
would be dipped in oil. In this less than luxurious transport, Raleigh
eventually reached the Cape Verde Islands, after facing forty foot waves and
storms that often blew the main mast level with the sea. Large numbers of the
crew had died and the expedition was soon obliged to return to Plymouth. It was
1579 and, at the age of only twenty-four, Walter already found himself in deep
trouble with the Privy Council. Gilbert and
Raleigh were both forbidden to sail
again.

Raleigh
returned to London in 1580, and along with Sir Thomas Perrot, was called
before the Council for an affray and sent to Fleet Prison to cool his heels for
six days. He was subsequently sent to the Marshalsea Prison for a fight on a
tennis court. Walter soon became embroiled with the Earl of
Oxford. He later took part
in negotiations with the Duc of Alencon, the brother of King Henri III of France, who wanted to married Queen Elizabeth, but was recalled to
France.

Walter was then sent to Ireland as a captain commanding a hundred
men. Sir Henry Sidney and Sir Humphrey Gilbert burnt villages and
massacred the population. Even Raleigh, with his troops, systematically
slaughtered three hundred Italian and Spanish mercenaries who had been sent to
Ireland by the Pope and the King of Spain but surrendered to
Arthur, Lord Grey of
Wilton, his superior officer. Elsewhere, Walter conducted himself bravely,
rescuing a comrade who fell from a horse during an ambush. Raleigh sought the comforts of home life and
sexual pleasure with a local woman named Alice Goold who, in time, bore him a
daughter. However, though he did not forget his clandestine family - Alice was
left money in his will, even though she had already died of the plague in
Kingston - Walter soon became bored with Ireland: commanding gaol birds and
other miserable creatures. He wrote to Leicester and
Walsingham hoping for an
introduction at Court. Walter Raleigh, an up and coming young man, was ready to
thrust himself to centre stage.

Raleigh was now aged twenty-eight, six foot tall,
a good looking man with an air of authority. He is said to have retained his strong Devonshire accent during
all his time at Court. In those days a regional accent was not such a
disadvantage as it has been of late. The spelling used in those days was rather erratic and thus "Raleigh" is just
one of the (over 40) ways in which his surname was written. He used numerous of
these spellings, with "Rawleigh", "Ralegh" and "Rawley" being more often used
than the currently accepted version. He is never known to have used the modern
"Raleigh" spelling. Back in England, he quickly
attracted the attention of the Queen,
now forty-eight: Thomas Fuller wrote in 1663:

'Captain Raleigh, coming out of Ireland... cast
and spread his cloak on the ground: whereupon the Queen trod gently'.

This,
now famous, incident supposedly took place on the present site of the Queen's
House at Greenwich Palace. The two became good friends, as shown when, soon
afterward, Walter wrote this poem on a window pane:

Raleigh was now fashioning himself as the
perfect Elizabethan courtier. He could talk politics in his strong Devon tongue.
Ambition and intellect was driving him into the company of the great and
brilliant. Elizabeth was determined to keep such a man and he was to remain at
court for the next ten years.

Raleigh became involved in important court
affairs. There were more French negotiations when the Duc of Alencon was, this time, accepted by Queen Elizabeth in marriage, quickly refused
again and forced to return to the Netherlands. Following this, Walter showed his
rising influence when, as a favour to Lord Treasurer Burghley, he interceded on
behalf of the latter's imprisoned nephew, the Earl of
Oxford. Raleigh enjoyed
court life and, when off duty, he enjoyed the pleasures offered by the Queen's
maids of honour even more. He accompanied Elizabeth to Hampton Court,
Nonsuch and Greenwich. By 1583, Elizabeth was inundating
Walter with favours: ornaments like the
two vases still held by All Souls College, Oxford; and property like Durham
House, a Bishop's Palace near the Strand on the north bank of the Thames. He
lived in great style: served silver plate featuring his coat of arms by thirty
liverymen in gold chains.

Sir Walter Raleigh

miniature by Nicholas Hilliard

Leicester was now back in favour, but he was
jealous of Raleigh. He introduced his stepson, Robert Devereux, Earl of
Essex,
to Elizabeth as Walter's rival. Despite this,
Raleigh continued to amass great
wealth. He acquired the monopoly controlling cloth exports from London and, in
1584, a similar monopoly of wines. He also profited from privateering including
booty from ships often valued at £10,000, an enormous sum in those days. A
diarist from Pomerania, recording a dinner at Greenwich in 1584, noted that Queen Elizabeth, though surrounded by great noblemen, was said to love Walter
Raleigh above all others. Raleigh was knighted the following year, for his plans
to found a colony in the Americas which he had already called Virginia in honour
of the Queen.

The aim of planting colonies in
North America was an most ambitious project bequeathed to Raleigh by his
half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert.
Sir Humphrey had tried, in 1578 and again in
1580, to set up such colonies with the services of the Portuguese pilot, Simon
Fernandez. Fernandez had crossed the Atlantic and returned three months later
with valuable information about the New England Coast Line. Following this,
Walter helped pay for a second expedition in 1583, when Sir Humphrey set sail in
the Bark Raleigh. He reached Newfoundland, but perished aboard the Squirrel
near the Azores on his return.

From Durham House, Walter planned a third
expedition with John Dee and Thomas Harriot, one of the greatest mathematicians
of the day. It sailed in May 1584 and arrived off Florida in Jul. They made a
landing on Roanoke Island where they found a palisaded village. The land was a
paradise and the inhabitants friendly and, after some weeks, they persuaded two
of the natives to return with them to England. They arrived safely from 'Virginia'
in the Sep following.

At Raleigh's request, Richard Hakluyt, a
well-known Elizabethan historian, wrote the 'Discourse' portraying the
Americas as a promised land of honey, venison, palm trees, wine, sassafras (a
cure for venereal desease), gold and red copper. He insisted the Spanish genocidal policies were
an outrage and that the Queen should give every assistance the Native Americans.
Raleigh was much influenced by these ideas and decided to arrange another
expedition. This time, however, he was to remain at home.

Raleigh was a hardworking
servant of the Crown. He was elected a Member of Parliament for Devon; and was
appointed as Vice Admiral of the West, Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall and Lord
Warden of the Stanneries (the mining towns of Dartmoor). He served his Royal
mistress well, she called him her 'Water'. Sir Walter was now identified with the anti-Spanish foreign policies of
Leicester and Francis Walsingham. He was instrumental in uncovering the
Babington Plot to put Mary,
Queen of Scots, on the English throne. Babington and his conspirators were
hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn and Raleigh was given his lands as a
reward. However, the only property which Walter really desired was his old Devon
family home of Hayes Barton. He tried to purchase it from the owner, Richard
Duke, but failed. Perhaps as consilation, Walter was granted twelve thousand
acres in Ireland and, later, forty-two thousand acres including the beautiful
castles of Lismore (near Cork) and Waterford. Raleigh replaced the chimneys of his Youghal home, with some more like those
at his birthplace, Hayes Barton.

In 1585 he was made Governor of Jersey. Although he was governor for
three years he only visited the island for thirteen weeks. In that time he
managed to persuaded Queen Elizabeth
not to dismantle the old castle at Mont Orgueil, and he encouraged the islanders
to continue to take part in the growing Newfoundland fisheries. While there, he built "Elizabeth
Castle" on a rocky islet, in the 1590s. He was the first Governor to live
in the newly built castle and even though it had just been completed he had an
extension built in front of the decorated Queen Elizabeth Gate. This was to
become known as Ralegh's Yard and the Iron Gate.

Raleigh owned a number of
privateering vessels, two of which, in 1586, captured Sarmiento de Gamboa, the
Commander of the Spanish campaign to destroy the Incas. In return for a ransom,
SirWalter arranged for the commander's restoration to Spain and proffered the
suggestion that the Spaniard should accept him as a double agent. Raleigh had a
relish for intrigue such as this and, though his offer was initially accepted,
he handled the situation badly and was dropped by Spain when suspicions of his
real loyalties were aroused. Now he turned his mind to plans for a settlement in
America.

SirWalter chose his cousin, Sir Richard Grenville, to head his second expedition to the New World. They sailed from
Portsmouth on 9 Apr 1585 with five ships and two pinnaces. Grenville sailed
in the Tiger with Simon Fernandez as the pilot. Phillip
Amadas and
Ralph Lane, from Lympstone (Devon), were fellow officers on board. There were initial
difficulties when a pinnace sank in a storm off Portugal. However, though the
fleet was scattered, it managed to collect again off Puerto Rico. They then
sailed on past Hispaniola, the Bahamas and up the Florida Channel, where
disaster struck. The Tiger grounded, spoiling valuable stores. Grenville
and Lane were at Loggerheads. The former decided it was time for action and led
a party inland. During this exploration, John White recorded a valuable insight
into Native American life. Sunflowers and pumpkins flourished and so did tobacco
which the natives smoked. It had been grown in England as early as 1565, but it
was Raleigh who made it fashionable following this very expedition. Grenville
soon returned and, armed with these details of local crops, he began to build a
settlement on Roanoke Island. He established about a hundred men there before
setting off back to England in the Tiger. On the return voyage, he
boarded the Santa Maria, a Spanish Treasure Ship filled with gold, silver,
pearls, sugar and spices. Grenville eventually met SirWalter in Plymouth with
half this Spanish crew to ransom. The Queen and the investors were delighted.

Lane remained in the fort at Roanoke with a
hundred and seven men. He dispatched a party, including Harriot and White, to
Chesapeake Bay to make the first maps of North America and what is now Virginia;
but the settlement depended heavily upon the Native Americans for food and this
led to many disputes. Raleigh had problems in sending a relief expedition and
when Grenville finally arrived and found no-one remaining. Sir Francis Drake
had, in fact, rescued them from the harsh conditions which they could no longer
bear. Unfortunately, in the chaos of the evacuation, many of their voluminous
records were thrown overboard by the uncaring sailors and three men were even
left behind by accident. The remainder arrived in Plymouth on 28 Jul 1586.

Raleigh was very disappointed over the
abandonment of the Roanoke project. His enemies were always ready to take
advantage of such failures. He had even been appointed 'Captain of the
Guard', an honorary position of great prestige and significant because it
required constant attendance on the Queen. A further crisis ensued when the trial and execution of Mary,
Queen of Scots, caused Elizabeth to have what amounted to a nervous breakdown.
She only began to recover when she found a new favourite in the impetuous young Earl of Essex, whom she had made Master of the Horse.
SirWalter was being
overlooked in favour of a mere twenty-year-old. Elizabeth herself was
fifty-four.

In 1588, Felipe II launched
the Great Armada
against England. This was and the largest fleet Europe had ever seen. Raleigh attended
a Council of War to discuss the English defence. Present were Lord Grey,
Sir
Richard Grenville, Ralph Lane, now Master General of the Forces, Governor of
Guernsey and the Isle of Wight. As Vice Admiral and Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall,
SirWalter set up his headquarters at Plymouth, from where he raised an army of
5,560 men and ninety-six light horse. Meanwhile, Admiral Howard of
Effingham arrived in the Bark. Raleigh renaming it, the Ark Royal,
collected a fleet with Drake and Hawkins. SirWalter
contributed much to the English victory.

Despite this triumph, Essex' threat to
Raleigh's position at Court soon resurfaced. Raleigh quarrelled with Essex and was challenged to a
duel. Eventually, however, the latter was prevented from taking part by the
strenuous intervention of other parties. Raleigh left for Ireland, where he
began to spend much more of his time: converting Lismore Castle and visiting his
neighbour, Spenser, who was writing his 'The Fairie Queen'.

Raleigh was now determined to refound his lost
colony. In 1587, the Lion, commanded by Simon Fernandez, accompanied by a
fly boat and a pinnace, sailed from Plymouth. Fernandez was to assist John White
in founding the City of Raleigh under Mantio - a native American brought back on
the first voyage and now a Christian - as Raleigh's representative. Upon their eventual arrival, however, White
and Fernandez were not on best terms and the situation was brought to a head
when the latter stopped at Roanoke, but refused to take the settlers on to
Chesapeake. White managed to contact Mantio's mother who told them that the
remaining Englishmen had been killed by a rival tribe. White decided to attack
these people, only managed to succeed in killing a native ally during an attack
on a misidentified village. He later tried to make amends, but
was largely distracted by the birth of his grandaughter, five days afterward.
She was the first English child born in America and was named Virginia
for obvious reasons.

Fernandez did eventually return home, along with
John White, whom the colonists insisted must inform Raleigh of their new
unintended location. After a disastrous journey via the Azores and Ireland, they
arrived back in Southampton. An immediate relief force was delayed by the Armada
crisis but, with this prevented, one did leave with White amongst the
passengers. Unfortunately, however, the captains were more interested in
privateering than their mercy mission and, when they were attacked off La
Rochelle, a wounded White was forced to return to England. It was not until 1590
that John White was finally able to return to Roanoke. He found the settlement
abandoned and overgrown, though signs indicated that the majority of colonists
had moved on to Chesapeake while others may have joined Mantio's people.
Circumstances prevented White from verifying such supposition and he returned to
England. The settlers may have survived until as late as 1607, when a popular
theory has them being slaughtered along with the local natives in the Chesapeake
Bay area by a warrior chieftain named Powhatan. Whatever the reality, Raleigh
had lost £40,000.

Elizabeth
Throckmorton

Elizabeth Throckmorton
was nineteen when
she first appeared at Court. She was the daughter of Sir Nicholas
Throckmorton,
Queen Elizabeth's first Ambassador to Paris, and her brother
Arthur was also a
courtier. Both their parents were dead and they relied on the Court for their
livelihood. Bess was intelligent, forthright, passionate and courageous. Though
Raleigh was in his early forties, the two fell madly in love. In the summer of
1591, Bess discovered she was pregnant and they secretly married. They were
together, but catastrophe loomed.

As Vice-Admiral, Sir Walter had planned to sail,
on the Revenge under Lord Thomas Howard, in an expedition to intercept
Spanish treasure ships from Nombre de Dios in Peru and Vera Cruz in Mexico. They
were anchored at Flores in the Azores. His place, however, was taken by Sir
Richard Grenville. The English fleet was surprised by the Spaniards and though
Sir Richard fought them to a standstill, he died of his wounds. Raleigh
continued in his official duties, including the execution of catholic priests.
He tried to save one Plasden from the gallows - an incident which did not endear
him to his enemies - but Topcliffe, the Queen's enforcement officer, hanged him
all the same. Still, the Queen continued to reward Sir Walter for his efforts:
Sherborne Castle in Dorset was placed in his hands, along with the prosperous
Willscombe Manor, confiscated from the ageing Thomas Godwin, Bishop of Bath and Wells who made
the blunder of getting married.

Raleigh's young wife, however, could no longer
keep her pregnancy secret. Bess gave birth to a baby boy who was quickly put out
to a wet nurse so she could resume her place as Lady-in-Waiting. When SirWalter
returned from the sea, he arranged for the baby and nurse to go to Durham House.
However, on 31 May 1592, his marriage was discovered. The Queen had not
granted permission for such a match and Raleigh was promptly arrested. Elizabeth
expected Walter and Bess to sue for a pardon and, while their fate lay in the
balance, she even confirmed the lease of Sherborne. However, the couple refused
such a humiliating course of action and by 7 Aug, that same year, the
Queen's favourite had fallen into five long years of disgrace.

Elizabeth's refusal to forgive his
marriage was a source of great bitterness to Raleigh; but, though he was no
longer in favour, he still owned Durham House and Sherborne Castle and benefited
from his monopolies. He had been shamed, but not ruined. However, he was still
separated from his beloved wife. A situation which was only brought to and end
by a stroke of luck.

Sir John Borough captured the Madre de
Deos, a floating castle of 1,600 tons with seven decks manned by 800
crewmen. Hawkins estimated the haul at £500,000 and
Lord Burghley sent
Raleigh
to Dartmouth to divide the spoils. Elizabeth benefited from most of the bounty.
Raleigh secured no riches but, on 22 Dec, Arthur Throckmorton was
able to record in his diary that 'my sister was delivered from the Tower'. A
grudgingly grateful Queen had allowed SirWalter and
Bess to start
their new life together at Sherborne. The couple's first child must have died, but
Bess
was soon pregnant again and their son, Wat, was born in 1593. In the same year,
Raleigh started to build a grand new house, south of the old castle at
Sherborne, on the site of a hunting lodge. His half-brother, Adrian Gilbert, was
the surveyor. SirWalter settled down to the life of a country gentleman. He
became firm friends with Charles Thynne of nearby Longleat in Wiltshire and also
turned to his brother, Carew, who became a close companion.

Barred from the court, Raleigh busied himself in Parliament. He spoke on
religious matters and the need for a strong British naval force, but ill
advisedly questioned James VI of Scotland's succession to Elizabeth. Essex
continued to try to blacken his name, a cause which was helped by SirWalter
having befriended the playwright, Christopher Marlowe, who was a well-known
atheist. To improve his image, Raleigh arrested a half-Cornish, half-Irish
Catholic priest. He had him convicted in Dorchester (Dorset), hanged, drawn and
quartered, and his head stuck on the pinnacle of St. Peter's Church in the same
town.

Away from courtly life, Raleigh turned his
thoughts to the lethal glittering El Dorado. When, in 1594, the reconnaissance
mission to Guyana had seized Sarmiento de Gamboa, this Spanish aristocrat told
Raleigh of the legend of El Dorado: the fantastic golden kingdom said to be
hidden in remote South America. The Caribbean waters were swarming with English
privateers like Drake who had sacked San Domingo and Cartagena; but
SirWalter
wanted to take a broader approach and establish a real English foothold on the
American continent from which to make an effective challenge to Spanish power in
the area. The fabled El Dorado would be an ideal base for such a grand design.
His fleet sailed in 1595: four ships manned by three hundred soldiers and
adventurers, including Lawrence Keymis, an Oxford mathematician who had
abandoned a Balliol fellowship to join him.

Raleigh appeared off Trinidad and wiped out the
harbour grand at Port of Spain. He burnt the town of San Joseph and captured Don
Antonio de Berrio, the seventy-four year old Spanish Governor. This soldier had led a number of expeditions up the Orinoco to look for El Dorado and
SirWalter hoped this experience would help. Accompanied by
some additional vessels and a crew of one hundred, Raleigh spent a month
gathering provisions and then set off up the Orinoco. They found the Native
American guides to be of little use, but still struggled on inland against the
current. During a meal stop on the riverbank, Raleigh found a basket hidden in
the bushes which he believed to be a toolkit dropped by a local metal refiner.
They travelled on for fifteen days until they found a group of friendly locals:
the women were attractive, but the men were drunkards. The English sailors were
well behaved compared to the visiting Spaniards who had been cruel and lusty.
A further six days travelling
brought them to the junction of the Orinoco and Caroni Rivers. The chief of a
native village here had been executed by Berrio, and the place was now ruled by
Topiawari, a man of great age. He is said to have been one hundred and ten years
old. Raleigh and the new chief became firm friends and the explorer was
able to send out further reconnaissance parties. The stones were found to
be worthless. Rainstorms were now becoming frequent and SirWalter was forced to
return to Trinidad. He took Topiawari's son with him but left two men behind.
One, Francis Sparrow, was later captured and imprisoned in Spain. The other,
Hugh Godwin, Raleigh's cabin boy, was absorbed by the tribe and almost forgot
his native tongue.

SirWalter now sailed for Cumana and the
Venezuelan Coast in order to raid the Spanish settlements there. He lost four
men in a skirmish, but some twenty-seven of his men also died of disease on
board ship. He finally exchanged Berrio for a wounded Englishman and
returned, disillusioned, to England to write 'The Discovery of the Large, Rich and Beautiful
Empire of Guyana', the present day Venezuela.

For all the vision of empire
inspired by Raleigh's Guyana expedition, the threat from Spain had not
diminished and even seemed to be growing. England's Privateering attacks were
now reducing due to the deaths of Drake and Hawkins and Spanish ships were able
burn both Mousehole and Penzance in Cornwall, and threaten Ireland. Lord
Burghley decided that attack was the best
means of defence and planned for Raleigh and Essex to attack Cadiz. Elizabeth blew hot and cold over the idea but eventually she agreed and 5,000
sailors, 65,000 soldiers and £30,000 were raised, largely from Dutch sources.
On 11 Jun 1596, Lord Admiral Howard in the Ark Royal,
Essex as joint
commander in the Duc Repulse, Raleigh in the Warspite and over a
hundred other vessels sailed from Plymouth, with Sir
Francis De Vere as Marshal of
the Army. It was a command nightmare. They arrived to Cadiz on 29 Jun. Raleigh was ordered to
stop the merchant ships slipping their moorings off Port Royal. Howard, instead
of attacking the harbour, ordered his fully armed men into boats but the weight
made them overturn and scores of helpless soldiers were sent to their deaths.
Raleigh rowed over to the Duc Repulse, gave Essex and Howard a dressing
down and persuaded them to begin the attack on the Spanish Fleet. Deep in the
harbour of Cadiz the might of Spain lay at Raleigh's mercy; but, as the smoke
thickened and the galleons cut their cables, Raleigh fell in excruciating
pain. A cannon ball had struck the deck of the Warspite and his calf had been
shredded into a bloody mess 'interlaced with splinters'. Raleigh
watched as the Spanish ships tumbled into the sea. The English troops then sacked the town.
SirWalter was carried ashore in a litter from which he watched the proceedings
with contempt. The prize of the whole raid, however, were the rich merchant
ships still moored in the harbour. Howard, Vere and Essex decided to attempt
ransom these, but orders were issued by
Felipe II of Spain to
have the Duke of Medina Sidona - the Armada commander of 1588 - order the entire
fleet to be scuttled and burned. Twelve million ducats sank: a pointless
sacrifice to uphold Spanish pride.

Raleigh returned to England and, on 1 Jun
1597, limped into the ageing Elizabeth's presence. Partly as a rebuke to the
incompetent Earl of Essex,
SirWalter was reinstated as Captain of the Guard. A
favourable appointment for Raleigh's friend, Lord Cobham, further widened the
rift between the two men, which Cecil tried desperately to repair. Despite these
new favours though, SirWalter's wealth was beginning to dwindle. He had spent
too much of his own money on attacking Spain in the Americas and his Babington
lands and privateering fleet had been swallowed up in the expense. The second
half of the 1590s were terrible years for everyone. Four summers of torrential
rain rotted the harvests and people were dying of
starvation. Raleigh even found it prudent to make out a new will. Conversations with Essex and
Cecil
now turned to an attack on Ferrol: an expedition known as 'The Islands' Voyage'.
Again, a hundred ships set sail. The commanders were the
same as the previous expedition to Cadiz and things did not start well. They hit
a series of storms off the Bay of Biscay and were quickly scattered. Raleigh and
Essex managed to head for port, but discovered that
Howard and his squadron were
off Corunna.

When the fleet eventually reformed, they again
sailed to attack the Armada gathering at Ferrol, but Raleigh became separated
from the main group and ended up chasing a imagined Armada to the Azores. Essex
was furious and headed off in pursuit. At Flores, Raleigh was granted
permission, by Essex, to reprovision his ships.
Essex then sailed away but later
got word to SirWalter to join him in an attack on the Island of Fayal.
Raleigh
arrived at the given destination only to find Essex to be no-where in sight. He
held off for his commander to appear, but enemy gunfire eventually forced him to
act. When Raleigh landed on the reef and made for the shore, bullets were flying
about him. He managed to attack the Spanish defenders and, though shot through
the calf, captured the town. Too late to help, Essex finally arrived and, in his
depressed state, found Raleigh's heroism a personal insult.

Essex demanded a court martial and Raleigh's
death for a breach of order and articles. Raleigh protested his innocence and
begged to defend himself as a principal commander under his lordship. The
sacking of Fayal was, in effect, the reprovisioning of his crews, which is what
Essex had ordered. A smarting
Essex brought the meeting to a close and was rowed
across to the town. Here he cashiered all of Raleigh's officers. Howard
intervened and an ugly incident was narrowly avoided. Essex set about plundering
Villa Franca and other islands in the Azores while Felipe II, ulcerous and
close to death, decided to attack the unguarded England. A new Spanish Armada
sailed up the Bay of Biscay through terrible storms but, fortunately, the enemy
was dispersed and Essex and Raleigh were eventually able to return to Plymouth.
The Queen vented her anger at Essex, but was not pleased with Raleigh either.

Eventually, Essex
was sent to Ireland in disgrace. Even his campaign there was a disaster. The Earl was arrested at Essex
House on the Strand and taken to the Tower. A trial for
treason followed by a sentence to death. Raleigh, as Captain of the Guard,
attended his execution on Ash Wednesday 1601. Despite Essex declaring Raleigh to
be a true servant of the Queen, the mob thought SirWalter to be gloating over
their hero's death and he was obliged to withdraw to the armoury.

The end of Elizabeth I's reign saw mounting
problems for Raleigh. He discovered his agent at Sherborne was disloyally acting
against his interests and had to place the man in the town stocks. Meanwhile, in
Ireland, his steward, an objectionable man named Pyne, was likewise found to be
swindling him out of the returns from his plantations. SirWalter was soon
forced to sell Munster to Robert Boyle for only £1,500. He remained Captain of
the Guard to the seventy-year-old Queen, but it was only a matter of time
before the accession of King James of Scotland, son of Mary Queen of
Scots.Elizabeth died on 24 Mar 1603 and three days
later James began his progress south to London. Raleigh met him at Northampton
on 25 Apr and asked him to sign some papers. 'Oh my soul man I have heard
rarely of thee!' was the new King's terse response. A few days later, Raleigh
led the Royal Guard at Elizabeth's funeral.

By May, King James had recalled all monopolies,
given the Captaincy of the Guard to a Scottish favourite and dismissed Raleigh
from the Governorship of Jersey. He gave him just £300 in compensation.
Raleigh, still innocent of plots afoot to destroy his reputation, and unaware of
the King's desire for a peaceful foreign policy, offered to supply James with a
written account for his strategy for continuing the war against Spain. He was
damned. James acted swiftly to remove him from London. Durham House was returned
to the Bishop and Raleigh was to be out in two weeks.

Two months later, SirWalter tried to join James in a reconciliatory hunt with in Windsor Forest. However, he was informed
by Cecil that the King did not want him to ride and had charged the Privy
Council instead to question him on certain matters of treason. Raleigh, though
he had knowledge of at least one plot against the King, was totally innocent of
any involvement in two lesser ones.

The so-called Main plot of 1603, hatched by the Warden of the Cinque
Ports, Henry Brooke, Lord Cobham, and by Sir Walter
Raleigh, remains a puzzling affair, doubts surrounding its nature,
purpose, even its existence. Down the years, government investigations
into the conspiracy have been interpreted as, on the one hand, the hasty
over-reaction of a nervous new King and administration to the merest
expression of grumbling discontent. In an altogether more sinister
light, they have been taken to represent a settling of scores between
court factions, the final triumph of Sir Robert Cecil and the
Howard family over increasingly isolated opponents.

The Council decided to arraign him for
trial. Plague was raging in London, so the Court moved
south to Winchester. Raleigh was escorted from the city, whereupon the London
mob turned out in force to jeer the traitor who had betrayed their beloved
Essex. On 17 Nov 1603, the Great hall of Winchester Castle was converted
to house the Court of King's Bench. The judges were SirJohn Popham, Chief
Justice of Kings Bench; Sir Edmund Anderson, Chief Justice of Common Pleas and
his prison judges, Sandys and Warburton. Raleigh had no detailed knowledge of
the charges and they were only read out to him on the morning of the trial. He
was accused of plotting with his friend, Lord Cobham, to foment rebellion
and of inviting foreign invasion, intending by these means to depose and kill James I,
murder his family, and advance the King's
cousin, Lady Arabella Stuart, to the throne. He was charged with taking part in the
so-called Bye Plot to capture the King and force him to relax anti-papal
legislation. A third indictment concerned a lost manuscript book which Raleigh
had allegedly given to Cobham to confirm the basis of their treasonable plans. A
fourth charge indicated he had urged Arabella to write to the
King of
Spain for support. While, lastly, he was accused of instigated Cobham's
correspondence to raise 600,000 crowns from Spain through the mediation of
Charles de Ligne, Count of Aremberg, an old friend of Cobham who, in
the summer of 1603, arrived in England as a special Ambassador, sent by
Archduke Albert to congratulate James on his accession.

The authorities charge was based on Cobham's testimony, always regarded as problematic. This air of mystery results in large measure from the loss of
original documentation; there is, in particular, no surviving
examination of Raleigh. To some degree, the same problem confronts those
investigating the parallel Bye plot of Sir Griffin Markham and the
priest William Watson, for not one of Markham's examinations is now
extant. With the Bye, however, there are at least the extensive,
candid confessions of Watson, and of his associate Anthony Copley.
For the Main there is nothing comparable.

The trial was a farce. SirEdward Coke prosecuted
while Raleigh defended himself. He denied all involvement in the Bye Plot, which
had been treason of the priests who organised it.
Coke replied, 'Thou art a
monster! Thou hast an English face but a Spanish heart!' He was refused
permission to call Lord Cobham as his chief defence witness and only Cecil spoke
in his defence. Old colleagues like Lord Henry Howard were not at all helpful.
Eventually, SirWalter produced Cobham's letter which he had hidden in his
doublet. It had been wrapped around an apple and thrown through his prison
window back at the Tower. SirEdward Coke parried with a retraction of the letter which
Cobham had been forced to sign. It took the jury just fifteen minute sto reach
their verdict: Guilty. Popham pronounced the sentence with brutal relish:
Raleigh was to be hanged, drawn and quartered. One of the trial judges
later declared that, 'the trial injured and degraded the justice of
England'. Even Popham was heard to say, 'I hope I shall never see the
like again'.

Thomas Egerton, created Lord
Chancellor and Baron of Ellesmere in Jul 1603, was appointed Lord
Steward for the trials of both Henry, Lord Cobham, and Thomas,
Lord Grey of Wilton. Ellesmere,
characteristically, took his duties very seriously. On account of his
forthcoming `judicial' role, he was not closely involved with
investigations into the treasons. Nevertheless, surviving papers display
his keen interest in the prosecution, an interest also evident in his
apprehension of Cobham's lawyer, William Gosnall, and steward,
Richard
Mellersh, during Oct 1603. He was aware of the prosecution's obligation to
demonstrate the strength of Cobham's self-condemnatory accusation of
Raleigh. Ellesmere also finds persuasive those rather tenuous
proofs which reinforce Cobham's evidence by demonstrating that the
treason had been planned by both suspects, long before.

Richard Boyle

1° E. Cork

Raleigh appealed to Cecil, the Privy Council and
the King. James, in a grotesque exhibition of royal clemency, exiled
Markham and
imprisoned Lords Grey and Cobham as they were about to be executed. He issued a pardon
for Raleigh but he was to be kept a prisoner in the Tower of London.
While Raleigh was imprisoned, he sold Lismore along with 42,000 acres for
£1,500 to Richard Boyle, who later became the first Earl of Cork.

Raleigh was assigned two rooms on the second
floor of the Bloody Tower and here he lived for some thirteen years. Though
there were occasional summonses before the Privy Council and one brief removal
to a less conspicuous gaol. LadyRaleigh was allowed to visit him and conditions
were so relaxed that their second son, Carew, was born in the Tower in 1605.
Wat
was still a healthy child though, at one point, he almost died of the plague. SirWalter's financial position was desperate.
He lost their home due to a legal slip and was obliged to pawn a diamond given
him by the late Queen. King James did, however, allow
LadyRaleigh a pension.

SirWalter now started writing his 'War with
Spain', his 'Instructions to His Son' and, of course, his famous 'History
of the World' which King James did eventually allow him to publish. Raleigh
also found friendship with the King's neglected wife, Queen Anne,
whom he began to turn to for support. He was soon appointed as tutor to her son,
Henry, Prince of Wales: a fine young man who is said to have proclaimed that
'None but my father would keep such a bird in a cage'. Sadly Henry
died of typhoid, in 1612, after swimming in the Thames, leaving his incompetent
brother, Charles, as heir to the throne.

The King, meanwhile, was kept busy entertaining
his many favourites at court. Robert Carr had been given Sherborne castle, but
he now fell out of favour and James became interested in George Villiers, said
to have been the most beautiful man in England. SpanishAmbassador Gondomar encouraged the King's
extravagance in order to extract the best deal possible for Spain. Desperate for cash, King
James began to lend a sympathetic ear to Secretary Westwood. He suggested a
resurrection of Raleigh's plans to discover the glittering gold which was
supposedly hidden along the banks of the Orinoco.

Raleigh and Leymis believed that gold could be
found at the junction of the Rivers Orinoco and Caroni; but their friend,
Topiawari, was no longer alive to help them and Berrio had built a small fort at
San Thome to bar their way. Cecil desptached Sir Thomas Roe to reconoiter the
situation. He returned with extensive knowledge of the Guyana region but also
with a strong conviction that El Dorado was a myth. Despite this, he did believe
that San Thome could easily be captured and suggested that a renegade Spaniard
might be persuaded to offer knowledge of hidden gold to the English. Cecil gave
this careful consideration but died, in 1612, before he was able to act. The
vehemently anti-Spanish Sir Ralph Winwood no took up Raleigh's cause, along with
Villiers and on, 19 Mar 1616, SirWalter was released from the Tower.

Preparation for the voyage took over a year,
during which time Raleigh had to raise some £30,000. The £8,000 compensation
for his loss of Sherborne, the sale of his wife's Mitcham estates and all his
personal wealth was poured into the project, while Bess pressed her noble
relative for even more. Their son, Wat, now aged twenty-two, was to play an
important role at his father's side. He had grown into an energetic, reckless
young man and, though he was a great a help in finding recruits in Deptford, he
could also be something of a liability. Once, at dinner, he exclaimed that he
had recently visited a local whore, only to find that his father had lain with
her but an hour before. Raleigh boxed his ears.

On 26 Aug 1613, SirWalter received his
commission: an interesting document which contained the phrase 'under print of
the law' scribbled over the more usual 'trusted and well beloved'. He was still
a traitor who was officially dead. Relations with Spain were strained and, if Raleigh injured any Spanish subject during the expedition, his life would be
forfeit. He had to pass through Spanish territory, sink a mine close to one of
their forts, work it and transport its treasures without a fight. It seemed an
impossible task, but SirWalter hoped to get around such an awkward position by
enlisting the help of the French Huguenots. They would be able to act where Raleigh could not, as well as offering him a safe harbour while
James decided
between an Iberian peace or a full treasury. It was a totally unrealistic plan,
but SirWalter's only chance.

A friend of Raleigh's named Anthony Belle was
sent, with a certain Captain Faige, across the Channel to collect the Huguenot
ships which were to join the expedition. However, they instead decided to join a
trading junket to the Mediterranean where they were captured by pirates. Faige
languished in a Genoese gaol; while Belle found himself in Rome and, later,
Madrid, where he gave up the plans and maps for the English campaign in the
Americas. They were immediately forwarded to the Spanish in Guyana. Meantime, in
England, Ambassador Gondomar continued to protest to the King about Raleigh's
proposed sailing and eventually, though public opinion prevented its abortion,
James forwarded SirWalter's complete itinerary to the King of Spain.

Thus stabbed in the back, Raleigh, in a mood of
ironic finality, renamed his ship The Destiny whilst he placed his son,
Wat, in command. The crew were wild-eyed scum. His officers
were little better and, though Raleigh required strict discipline on the
expedition ships, this was often disregarded. SirWalter found himself obliged to bail three of his
captains out of trouble when they found they had no money to pay for shipboard
provisions. The sale of his few remaining pieces of plate covered the cost. The
vessels eventually sailed first from Gravesend to Plymouth and here the mayor
and corporation organised a banquet in Raleigh's honour. A drummer even beat out
a tattoo as the ageing West Country hero walked up the gangplank.

On 12 Jun 1617, Raleigh sailed
out of Plymouth Hoe. They were forced to shelter at Kinsale in Ireland for a
time and here SirWalter was generously entertained and his ships reprovisioned
by Lord Boyle. Raleigh reprovisioned on the Island of Gomera in
the Canary Isles, helped by the half-English wife of the Governor. Three days
after leaving, he decided to make for the Cape Verde Islands for more supplies
of fresh meat because fifty of the crew of the Destiny were out of action
through sickness. Seaths among the crew began to
increase. Raleigh's friend, John Talbot, who had served him for eleven
years in the Tower, was one of the lost. SirWalter fell sick himself and became so ill that he was
unable even to write his journal. It took the ships forty days to reach
Trinidad. It should have taken twelve.

On 14 Nov, they dropped anchor and Raleigh
rendezvoused with his old servant, Harry, a Native American who had been with
him in the Tower. He had almost forgotten his English, but provided the
campaigners with plentiful supplies for their journey. SirWalter was too weak
to lead the expedition up the Orinoco himself and his captains
wanted him to remain behind to guard their retreat and prevent the others from
turning tail at the first sign of the Spaniards. Raleigh agreed and gave
explicit instructions to Keymis to lead his men twenty miles downstream to San
Thome, establish a protective barrier of armed men between the fort and the
supposed site of the mine. Only if the Spaniards initiated an attack was
Raleigh's brother, George, to order their troops to fight. Otherwise, they were
to assess the mine's richness and work it to whatever state was safe. SirWalter's fate was now in the hands of others.

Ignoring SirWalter's orders, Keymis landed off San Thome.
Captain Cosmor and Raleigh's son, Wat, had led an attack with musketeers and
pikemen. Young Wat, determined to save his father's honour, rushed forward and a
bullet killed him instantly. A few weeks later, the Spanish Ambassador Gondomar
burst into King James' presence shouting, 'Pirates, Pirates, Pirates!'.
WalterRaleigh's death was sealed by a pathetic skirmish in a tiny jungle fort.

Raleigh wrote to Secretary Winwood, who unbeknown
to him, was now dead. He naturally wished to try and cover his dramatic failure
as best he could. He also wrote sorrowfully of his son's death to his wife,
Bess, 'God knows I never knew what sorrow meant till now. Comfort your
heart dearest Bess, I shall sorrow for us both'. He tried hard to rally his
men. Raleigh did manage to sail for
Newfoundland and eventually persuaded his men to return to Plymouth, via
Ireland, as he had always promised. SirWalter was met, not only by
Bess, but by
his distant cousin, Vice Admiral SirLewis Stukeley, who promptly arrested him.

Back in England and under
arrest, Raleigh toyed with thoughts of flight to France,
but he decided to face the King and justify his name.
Gondomor's trap had been sprung and he would end his
tour of duty in triumph. SirWalter returned to London
via Salisbury, past his beloved Sherborne. Here, he
feigned illness, so that he could write an appeal in
justification of his voyage to Guyana. However, Stukeley
was ordered to continue their journey to London. Raleigh
made further plans to escape but his servants informed
on him and even his cousin would not help. In order that
SirWalter should produce enough rope to hang himself,
the authorities allowed Stukeley to accompany him down
the Thames in a boat; but Raleigh was stopped at
Greenwich and arrested. Stukeley had
betrayed him. Stukeley was to die later, a lonely
lunatic on Lundy Island. On 10 Aug, Raleigh was a
prisoner in the Tower once more.

On 15 Oct, King
James received a letter from the King of Spain sparing
Raleigh from execution in Madrid, but urging, in the
light of delicate negotiations of marriage, that his
death in London would please his most Catholic Majesty.
The Attorney General, SirEdward Coke gave his opinion
that SirWalter was a man 'civilly dead'.
James, to avoid a show trial when the Nation from the
Queen down were all in his support, decided that a small
group of commissioners should convict him. On 22
Oct, the Attorney General charged him that he
proposed war between England and Spain. The Solicitor
General added that he had tried to flee from justice and
his behaviour at Salisbury had been a fraud to deceive
King and state. Raleigh defended himself stoutly but, on
28 Oct, he was driven from the Tower to
Westminster Hall before a succession of the King's
Bench, a bedraggled and broken man. The Lord Chief
Justice explained that his treason could not be
pardoned, said he had been valiant and wise and a good
Christian, but execution was granted.

Sir Walter Raleigh

The execution was to take
place in the Old Palace Yard, Westminster on the same
day as the Lord Mayor's Show. Raleigh was housed
overnight in the Abbey gatehouse. Bess left him after
midnight. Charles Thynne of Longleat, from his
Sherborne days, came to say goodbye. Dean Tomson gave him
spiritual comfort. Communion was celebrated and he ate a
hearty breakfast, took tobacco and prepared for his last
journey. He dressed magnificently: a satin doublet,
black embroidered waistcoat, taffeta black breaches and
coloured silk stockings, hat embroidered night cap and a
black velvet cloak. The Old Palace Yard was crowded:
amongst the onlookers, the young John Eliot, Hampden
and Pym, watching the death of the last great
Elizabethan. As future Cromwellians, it is interesting
to wonder how they would have viewed this abuse of law.
Tomson and two sheriffs led SirWalter up to the
scaffold. He then made his final speech and ended,
'So I take my leave of you all, making my peace with
God.' Raleigh took off his gown and doublet
and asked the headsman to show him the axe. 'This
is sharp medicine...that will cure all my
diseases'. He placed his head on the block, refused
a blindfold and gave the signal to strike. The headsman
delayed: 'Strike man, strike!' The axe fell
and fell again. Raleigh's severed head was shown to the
crowd. A groan arouse with mutterings of, 'We have
not such another head to be cut off'.

That evening, Bess took
the head home in a leather bag. Later, she kept it in a
cupboard to show her husband's admirers. His body was
buried in St. Margaret's, Westminster, south of the
altar. Dean Tomson wrote:

'This was the news a week
since but it is now blown over, and he is almost
forgotten'

Since Sir Walter Raleigh was secretly backed by Queen Elizabeth he should be considered
a privateer rather than a pirate.